Tri-Deha Sadhana—Awakening the Three Divine Bodies
The three awakened bodies are hidden within the flow of our consciousness and energy. In the course of practice, we do not create them but allow them to manifest—they exist within us as seeds, but these seeds must be watered and tended, and then they will reveal themselves.
What are these three awakened bodies? They are three enlightened dimensions that exist within us but need to be infused with the divine and purified. These three dimensions are the physical, astral, and causal worlds. In themselves, these worlds are forms of illusion, maya, and it is in these worlds that we have established ourselves and live.
We live not only in the physical world—a part of us also lives in the subtle, astral world, and it is the astral body that determines the state of our mind, our health, the length of our life, and our destiny. Our physical body depends entirely on the astral body, on subtle, hidden, invisible mystical causes. But the subtle body itself does not exist independently of the entire universe—the subtle body has the causal body as its cause, which is why it is called causal: “causa” means cause, hence the name “causal body.” The subtle and physical bodies are like actors who come onto the stage, while the causal body is like the backstage area where they change costumes and which no one sees, yet it is precisely there that everything takes shape.
These three dimensions, these three bodies, are associated with three states: wakefulness, dreaming sleep, and dreamless sleep. These three dimensions constitute our karma; all three are subject to karma, cause and effect operate within them, and we are reborn, revolving among these three dimensions. Brahman, God, the Absolute, is beyond these three; he silently witnesses and observes when we are born in the gross worlds, when we acquire subtle bodies, and when we abide as the inert, witnessing “I Am” consciousness in the causal world. God, our foundation, Brahman, dispassionately, silently, and quietly, without becoming involved, simply observes—he observes himself and all these metamorphoses.
The practice of awakening the three bodies means that we activate these three dimensions and seek to bring divine wisdom and divine will into them, and with their help, through the blessing of divine grace, Anugraha, to form a pure manifestation of these three dimensions, so that they do not act on their own but serve as conduits of divine energies and divine will. Such conduits are called tri-deha, and the practice is called tri-deha sadhana.
Jnana-Deha—the Body of Wisdom
The first is jnana-deha, the body of wisdom. When we bring awareness, Anugraha, into dreamless sleep, into the causal body, the body of wisdom is born. This body of wisdom originates in the causal world, but then it leads us into the transcendent world, into turiya, the fourth state. When the causal body unites with the Atman, it is said that the body of wisdom has been attained. We must unite the awareness of God with the causal body, and when the awareness of God, the light of divine grace, and the causal body merge, the body of wisdom, jnana-deha, appears.
